Intercity is a design for a new type of work-building. Standing on the station square (Stationsplein) in the centre of Rotterdam, Intercity proffers a collection of business and public functions that are mutually reinforcing; along with various office typologies it boasts a restaurant, congress centre, squash centre, swimming pool and hotel. These functions provide the opportunity to combine, around the clock, work and relaxation with one's social life. Each function in addition maximizes the interaction between employees, which is often quite different in an informal situation than in the workplace. This way Intercity concedes to the tendency that the office is more and more becoming the locus where staff, clients and visitors meet. The public functions in Intercity supplement the city programme, and the public provides the urban entourage inside the building. This 72-metre-high flagship of Rotterdam sits on the building line of the Weena, adding to the mega-urban wall of that boulevard. It likewise continues the sequence of spaces - Stationsplein, a second clearing (Kruisplein) and a canal (Westersingel) - through a large gap in the building mass, thus strengthening the qualities of this sequence. The infrastructure at ground level is restructured so that Stationsplein and Kruisplein are freed for pedestrians. Intercity is a distinctive interstitial space that acts as a moment's respite in the above-named series of urban spaces. Intercity is designed as a vertical city, its individually functioning programmed components slung from a space frame shored up by four huge supports and spatially linked by large open interior and exterior spaces. This way light and air are delivered deep inside the building. Because Intercity has several public and non-public transport systems, the public can travel throughout the building without disturbing the privacy of the people working there. The expected flows of public makes exploiting the open internal spaces an attractive proposition for catering, retail and other branches of industry, thereby enriching the public domain in the city.

Place of education: TU Delft
Specialization: architectuur/architecture
Tutors: Herman Hertzberger, Wim van den Bergh & Arie Krijgsman